WOTD Ficlet:  Witching Hour
by Guardian Kysra
Summary: There is nothing she can do but this. Orihime and Ishida in the aftermath of Ichigo and Ulquiorra's epic battle atop the dome.


Author's Notes: This is an unedited first draft and takes place directly after Ichigo's momentous battle with Ulquiorra atop Hueco Mundo, after he leaves to fight for Karakura, leaving Orihime and Uryuu behind.

Witching Hour

A Word of the Day Ficlet

By Kysra

There is nothing she can do but this, she thinks with a frown and a dull look to her normally lively eyes. Even the reiatsu-tinged warmth of her healing shield cannot heat her frigid fingers or untwist the painful lump of her heart.

Uryuu is watching her with undisguised concern having given up on conversation sometime ago; and she's greatful for the silence. She's had ample time to become so accustomed to the absense of sount that the quiet is something familiar and comforting in the midst of the strangeness of being . . . _free_.

Or the illusion of being free . . . They are still in Hueco Mundo and if the days (weeks? months?) here have taught her anything, it's that this blank place with its sandy dunes, eternal night, and predominant dead silence is full of unpleasant surprises.

She wonders briefly if there is any trace of Ulquiorra left in this world or another, if she will always be watching Kurosaki-kun's back, if Karakura still exists as she knows (knew?) it, if any of this heartache was worth it after all. There are no answers spoken or heard, just the soft hum of her shield and the flutter of faery wings and the rustling of fabric and breath. She isn't expecting any.

Soon enough, Uryuu is back to being whole while she is still splintered and torn, her dress in tatters and her hope much the same; but she pastes on a smile that feels cold in her eyes and works to get Uryuu from the top of the dome to someplace "safe." (Her heart skips and skids a little when the thought finds her, _No where is safe._)

"Orihime?" Uryuu's voice is more insistent concern than inquiry, but she smiles at him just the same and pretends it doesn't hurt that he may be thinking to ask her if she even _wants_ to return home.

"Yes, Uryuu?" They find a spacious niche between the 'throne room' and the corridor that is only slightly less destroyed than the rest. She fervently, privately hopes they are not found, exposed as they are, by malcontents.

Uryuu, her faithful and honorable friend, seems unsure – the first time she's ever really seen him so. "Were you hurt . . . during the battle? You flew pretty far and –" He pauses as her hand flies up to the back of her head, feeling the matted, dry blood there.

She forces another smile, this one slightly vacuous and epically chipper, "I'm just fine! This is nothing compared to what my door and the streetlights can dish out!" But the truth is her head is killing her and the blood hasn't really stopped so much as slowed, and she doesn't even have the will to heal herself.

_I deserve this and more._

"Don't." Uryuu says, pinning her with possibly the most piercing, _present_ stare she has ever received from anyone and anywhere. It's a look of reprimand and . . . shame? "Don't you dare think something so ugly."

She swallows. The smile dies. Her eyes dim. There's no need to hide anymore, she tells herself. _I owe him – all of them – an explanation._ "I'm sorry." And with the words, her tears fall – the ones she cast into the desert to sparkle under the perpetual midnight moon.

"There's nothing to apologize for."

She wishes Kurosaki-kun was here – he deserved an apology the most – and Rukia and Renji and Chad and Nel. She wishes things had been different. She wishes she had made better choices no matter her best intentions. "There's everything to apologize for." Kami-sama! How could he look at her with such concern and affection when he had – only an hour ago – been run through the stomach by a friend because of _her_.

"I beg to differ, and I'm sure everyone else would agree." Uryuu's voice is calm, his eyes bright behind the ever-present lenses. Her hands fist and twist on her lap, in the remains of her skirt, her hair falling to hide the trembling of her lower lip and the tearstains on her cheeks.

"You are all wrong. Be – because I was w—weak –"

"You're the strongest person I – we all – know."

"—bec—cause I …(sniffle) thought I – I c—could d—destroy (sob) the Hyogoku by—by myself –"

"You should have asked us for help. We're nakama. We could have done this together."

"I c—couldn't! They –they – they (shudder) threeeaatened to k—kill ever-y-one—"

He still sat there, watching. She still sat there, rocking back and forth on her knees, crying. "That's why you left with them." His voice gave nothing away, but the sound did not offer the accusation she was hoping for, did not condemn her or speak of fault. It was as if he had known the truth of her 'capture' all along.

She wails, doubling over with the unbearable pain, the terrorizing relief, screaming that she betrayed them, that everything Aizen and Ulquiorra had said was true.

And then there is a gentle hand on her shoulder, the supporting strength of arms reaching around to hold at her back, the warmth of a _heartbeat_ beneath her ear. Uryuu cradled her, rocked her like a father would his scared child. "You didn't come here with the intent to harm anyone, did you?"

"N—no, I –"

"And your intentions were merely to help _us_ and save who you could, right?"

"Y-yes, but –"

"Your heart never called us 'enemy,' hm?"

"Absolutely not! It's just –"

"I know you healed the Arrancar when Aizen ordered it – maybe even when he hadn't; but that's just like you. You wouldn't be Orihime if you didn't care."

"Uryuu, please –"

"Hush now. You've had a difficult ordeal. You need to rest now."

And he just holds her until they are escorted out of the dome, out of Hueco Mundo, out of this circle of hell that now splays across her nightmares; but – in that moment – there is nothing she can do but this, allowing this small comfort from a long-time friend, allowing him to show her the magic to heal herself.

_Word: Magnanimous_


End file.
